Is Professor Muna Ndulo dead?Why can’t you speak out in defence of the people as you did under previous presidents?

By Osward Bwali

So many people have wondered why Professor Muna Ndulo, one of Zambia’s greatest legal minds, has not said a word about the ongoing attempts by President Hichilema to force changes to the Constitution of Zambia before the next election. First came Bill 7 and its bad proposals that reminded us of Edgar Lungu and the PF’s infamous Bill 10. Nearly everyone outside the UPND condemned the Bill. Professor Ndulo said nothing. Next came the Constitutional Court judgement that outlawed the process that led to the creation of Bill 7. Defenders of the constitution hailed the verdict and praised the judges for their show of rare courage to rule against the executive. Professor Ndulo said nothing. Then came Hichilema’s decision to appoint a Technical Committee to consult Zambians on whether they support his proposals in Bill 7 or not.  Nearly everyone outside the UPND has questioned the legality of the committee and condemned the president’s attempt to re-reintroduce Bill 7 using the backdoor. Professor Ndulo said nothing.

As Hichilema is raping the constitution, would this not be the most appropriate time for constitutional scholars or experts like Professor Ndulo to pull his weight behind the defence of the constitution? Many people, me included, remember how Professor Ndulo was at the heart of public conversations on opposing Bill 10. Ndulo warned us that Lungu was out to install a constitutional dictatorship using Bill 10. He appeared on public platforms and wrote several articles denouncing the Bill. Given that most of the proposals in Hichilema’s Bill 7 are the same proposals that were contained in Lungu’s Bill 10, why has Professor Ndulo remained silent when what he opposed yesterday under one president is repeated today under a different president? Initially, I thought I had just missed his comments on Bill 7, so I combed the internet for a whole week in search of his views on Hichilema’s Bill. My search yielded nothing. 

The closest thing I found during my search was a post on X made by Linda Kasonde. She wrote the following on 18 October 2025: “Attached is Professor Muno (sic) Ndulo’s opinion on what a true Technical Committee should be in terms of composition and process. According to him, a real Technical Committee should be made up of a small group of experts rather than a Commission disguised as a Technical Committee. He notes lessons that Zambia can learn from the previous Constitutional Review Commissions and the Technical Committee of 2011. Please find time to read through it.” Excited, I rushed to the read the attachment that Kasonde had shared, but got disappointed when I discovered that the opinion, she was referring to was, in fact, a general policy paper written in January 2024 on constitution making in Zambia since 1964.  In it, Ndulo, perhaps without knowing that Hichilema and the UPND would later do what he was warning against, made a few observations that are still valid.

For instance, the Professor of Law stated that “Zambia has engaged in several constitution making processes since independence in 1964 without success. Previous processes have been executive driven and determined by narrow, short term political interests. There is still need for constitutional reforms in order to reform the authoritative vertical state structure that predisposes the state to authoritarian rule.  The process for constitutional reform must be well designed in order to succeed and avoid pitfalls of the past. It must be democratic, inclusive, representative and be insulated from political interreference by an Act of parliament. The process should be led by recognised experts in constitutional law. The Kenyan 2008-2010 constitution making process offers an ideal model that Zambia could adopt and contextualise in order to draft a legitimate constitution.”.

Ndulo should know better given that he was part of the experts that wrote the Kenyan constitution he is referring to. In fact, one would say he is a household name in Kenya. When I meet people on the streets or students at my university here in Nairobi, they mention his name immediately they know that I am from Zambia. So, given that the current process of constitution making that has been initiated by Hichilema is “executive driven and determined by narrow, short term political interests”, is not “insulated from political interreference by an Act of parliament”, is not “led by recognised experts in constitutional law”, why is Professor Ndulo silent as Hichilema tries to rape the constitution? Why is it so difficult for him to add his voice to the current discussions on constitution making, this time using a specific rather generalised example? In the absence of any explanation from Professor Ndulo, I think his silence on Hichilema’s bad attempt at constitution making emanates from three factors.

The first is that Professor Ndulo is conflicted by business interests. The institute that he founded alongside his brother, Professor Manenga Ndulo who is an economist at the University of Zambia, gets lucrative contracts from the same government that he is supposed to criticise. Here, I am talking about the Southern African Institute for Policy and Research (SAIPAR), a body that has previously and publicly advertised what it does for the UPND government through consultancies and workshops. Although the face of SAIPRA is a Dutch white lady named Dr Marja Hinfelaar who, according to its website, serves in some capacity and helps draw funding from Western donors, SAIPAR is owned by the Ndulo brothers. Under PF, the institute survived on foreign donors and some small government contracts, but Lungu was not as vindictive as Hichilema. If Professor Ndulo was to publicly criticise Hichilema today, the lucrative contracts that SAIPAR continues to get from several government ministries, which are its lifeblood, will be stopped.  As a result, he has opted to remain quiet so that SAIPAR can continue to benefit from the UPND government.

The second possible reason behind professor Ndulo’s silence is tribe. Like Hichilema, Ndulo is Tonga, and I am yet to come across any criticism in which he has criticised the current president. There are many illegalities that Hichilema has engaged in since 2021 and over which Professor Ndulo would have spoken out had the same occurred under Lungu. For instance, we still have an Auditor General who is not allowed by law to be in office. And a close friend in SAIPAR recently told me that Professor Ndulo privately criticises some of Hichilema’s decisions including Bill 7, but he will not voice out the same criticism publicly. It is hard to dismiss the perception that his silence on Hichilema’s illegalities and attempt to rape the constitution has to do with the idea that he is reluctant to criticise a man who hails from the same tribe as him. In July this year, Dr Sishuwa Sishuwa wrote an article on his X account in which he asked a question that I think remains relevant: “Why are Tongas, Lozis, and Zambians from Northwestern Province reluctant to publicly criticise Hichilema’s leadership failures?”  In addition to Ndulo, one can add Professor Oliver Saasa to the list of Tongas, Lozis and Northwesterners who used to speak out under PF but are now quiet even when similar wrongs occur.

As Dr Sishuwa pointed out in the same article, “we seem to have different standards for this president compared to those who came before him. If a leader can only provide five hours of electricity to the people in a day, they have failed. If a leader can only increase the cost of living, they have failed. If a leader…I can go on. In addition to denying the president the benefit of legitimate public feedback on his performance, the current trajectory sets a dangerous precedent where we make it seem like the responsibility of holding our public leaders to account falls on those who hail from the region where the president does not come from. If Tongas, Lozis and Zambians from Northwestern Province join in calling out the wrongs of Hichilema, he will no longer play the tribal card of reducing all criticism of his leadership to ethnic hatred.”

The third and final possible reason is that Professor Ndulo’s criticism of previous leaders was not based on principle; it was motivated by a desire to install in State House a leader he supports. This possibility differs from the one discussed in point number two in that while the previous one has tribe as its motivation, this one has politics. In other words, Professor Ndulo may not be tribal even if his silence and failure to criticise a Tonga-speaking president may seem to suggest so. He is simply reluctant to criticise a politician or a political party that he has quietly supported all along. This way, we may understand his criticism of all previous presidents as motivated by a desire to get his man and party into power, not by principle. Of course, it is possible that this point and the one above are both correct, but I raise it here because a part of me cannot come to terms with the unfolding reality: that one of Zambia’s best minds cannot bring himself to publicly criticising the actions of the UPND and president Hichilema on issues that cry for his voice, issues that he has spent decades of his professional life defending when they are undermined by those in power.

I love Professor Ndulo and it pains me to write this article, criticising him. As an anthropologist, I easily cede ground to best minds like him when it comes to understanding subjects of a public nature that are beyond my training, so when he decides to keep quiet, I feel robbed of the contribution of a respected and authoritative voice that can benefit the general public, those in power, and our democracy. And I doubt I am the only one. Only a few days ago, Solicitor General Marshal Muchende said that the government also has the right to propose constitutional changes. This was in defence of Bill 7 now disguised as public consultations by a not-so-Technical Committee. Even with the limited understanding of my anthropological training, I do know that a constitution is a set of rules that the people give to those in government, spelling out how they wish to be governed.

Professor Muna Ndulo, where are you? I know we are all mortal, but there have been no reports of your death, so I assume you are still alive and well. Why do you continue to keep quiet when Hichilema is violating the very principles that you defended in your policy brief, when the president is trying to rape the constitution of Zambia before the next election? Why can’t you speak out in defence of the people as you did under previous presidents? If you are now too old and are retired from public commentary, please let us know so that we excuse you.

Source: The Mast